


The Two Times We Stood Here

by LightningStriking



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Divergence - Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, M/M, Marriage Proposal, Stucky - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-28
Updated: 2016-03-08
Packaged: 2018-05-23 16:27:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6122458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LightningStriking/pseuds/LightningStriking
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>1940 something.  Bucky is going to war.  Steve is staying behind.  Their last night together, they make each other promises they will do everything in their power to keep.<br/>2000 something.  Bucky is back.  Steve won't let him go ever again.  With their promises kept, Bucky is ready to make a new promise.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know how to embed links but this story was entirely inspire by the incredible Bastille song Laughter Lines. If you like this story, or perhaps while reading it I strongly suggest you give the song a listen! Also, thank so much to my wonderful beta Cukimonstaaa!

“Just a little further,” Bucky said, his voice soft, and everything about that was wrong. Bucky wasn’t quiet, his face didn’t wear this solemnness comfortably. Not when he was always so quick to smile, to throw his head back and laugh with that particular laugh that made everyone listening smile along with him. He was always the first to tease Steve out of one of his brooding moods, to tell horrible jokes until the younger male had to give in, and grin with him.

            Bucky didn’t smile now. Instead, he turned to stare at Steve for a moment, his eyes dark, unreadable, and Steve wished in that moment he was everything Bucky had always been – so he could make things better like Bucky always had. But this, this moment the future was inexorably pulling them towards, he was helpless to stop it. So instead he bit back his questions about where they were going, and simply did his best to memorize every single line of that face that he could already draw blind-folded. Just in case... He hated to think it, hated to acknowledge the fear that left him gasping awake at night, panicked and certain the worse had already come to pass. Just in case.

            Where they were headed didn’t matter anyway. Steve had always followed Bucky anywhere. He was trying his best to follow him still. Yet just like when they were kids, his shorter legs, weaker frame could not keep up. This weak body he’d been given was now stealing his chance to follow Bucky, across the ocean and into the embrace of likely death, and he’d never hated it more. His fragile heart, his lungs that even now wanted to gasp for breath, they held him back. His small arms couldn’t hold Bucky here, safe. And for the first time, Bucky couldn’t do as he’d always done - slow down, wait for Steve to catch up. Bucky was leaving tomorrow, for England. For war. And Steve was staying behind.

            Steve had tried again this morning, one more recruitment office. One more application full of lies. One more useless hope that he could follow Bucky. Oh God, he’d pleaded, please let me follow. And one more time, he’d been denied. “Saving you from dying,” the harried doctor had said, as he stamped the denial on the application full of lies. But that doctor didn’t understand. Bucky was the one who Steve lived for. The one who made him feel alive when he’d spent his life trapped in a body that hovered one short step from death. All Steve was being saved for was dying a slower demise, if the worst should come to pass. That’s why he was so desperate to follow Bucky. Just in case...  

            He hadn’t told Bucky about his attempt. Knew Bucky would only be upset over it. Knew Bucky wanted nothing more than for Steve to stay here, safe and sound. Knew Bucky didn’t understand Steve’s feeble heartbeat threatened to stop altogether in his absence.  

            Holding aside a branch until Steve walked past it, Bucky fell still in the small clearing. Steve, who thought he’d known every corner of Brooklyn, had somehow never noticed this place. Not truly a park, it was simply a small wedge of wilderness tucked between two buildings, not even a block long. A small spot of nature that had miraculously missed the inevitable destruction of man. Standing in the middle of it, Steve stopped, and stared at Bucky who stood, hands in his pockets, studying a tree stump amidst the trees reaching far overhead. From here, the sounds of the city were filtered, far away, giving Steve the feeling they were the only two people for miles around. But then, hadn’t he lived his life feeling this way?

            “It was struck by lightning,” Bucky said, and his voice, it still held that soft tone. A trace of melancholy. His eyes were far away as he studied the tree trunk, cut off abruptly a few feet above the ground. “This place, it was my favorite place to come when I was little. Before I met you.” At that, his gaze lifted, met Steve’s, who knew this was important, even if he didn’t understand how.

            “I used to pretend I was Peter Pan in Neverland, or an explorer, a pirate. Sometimes I just used to come here and think. It was mine, and even though people passed by it every day, I never saw another person here. This tree, it was my favorite. And then, one night there was a storm, and it was struck by lightning. Split it right in two. I guess other people must have come here, because a few days later when I visited it, it had been cut down.”

            Pausing, Bucky trailed his fingers over the rings, the age and the history which had once been hidden inside a tree that would have towered over their heads. And now the tree was gone, leaving behind its story for the rest of time. “People might say that’s bad luck I guess. But I thought that was incredible, Steve. Everyone says your chances of doing something big, or having something incredible happen, are the same as getting struck by lightning. And this tree _did_. Even though I didn’t know what, I knew it meant something. Something that I thought was _mine_ , and it was struck by lightning.”

            Moving forward until he and Bucky were close enough to touch, Steve reached out, and delicately traced in circles along its history, along the lines ingrained in the wood, each one a year of life immortalized eternally in death. Brushing his hand right back in time through centuries, he read the story of a giant that had lived long before he was born. Until heaven had struck it down.

            “Steve.” Lifting his eyes, blue meeting gray, Steve thought he heard more in that one word than he could let himself hope for or believe. He thought he heard all the things that in his own heart he’d never dared voice. The love for a friend, then love for a brother, then love that had expanded beyond anything he’d ever known. A love that threatened his laboring heart with the sheer immensity of its weight, yet one he’d kept locked inside, never daring to let it out. Not when letting the most beautiful feeling he’d ever experienced finally gleam in the light of day might make the only person he’d ever felt it for turn away. In disgust perhaps, or shock. In disbelief that someone so small, so imperfect, might believe he’d have a chance with someone larger than life, like Bucky had always been.   And so even now, when he thought he heard a love that matched his own, he couldn’t chance believing it. Not when he might be wrong.

            “When I’m gone-” Bucky paused, his throat working nearly painfully before he drew a breath, forged on. “When I’m gone, you need to promise me something.”

            Steve could only stare at him, trying not to let the dangerous pain in his heart show. This wasn’t a condition, wasn’t his health fraying further. It was the fact that the unreliable, stuttering organ in his chest, it belonged to Bucky. It always had. And now Bucky was leaving. Steve wanted to reply, viscerally felt the soul-deep need to tell Bucky he’d do _anything_ he asked. But Steve couldn’t say a word.

            Biting his lip, Bucky took a breath that nearly trembled. Visibly steeling himself, the line of his jaw clenching painfully, he reached out, and took Steve’s hand in his own. Steve looked down, saw the way their fingers tangled together, and the fit was so perfect he wanted to cry. Wished hopelessly he’d known this before. Wished he could feel that perfect fit every day the rest of his life. Blinking rapidly, a soft gasp was jerked from his lungs when Bucky stepped closer, wrapping a hand around the nape of Steve’s neck, a thumb at his jaw tilting Steve’s face up until their eyes met once more. And Steve saw the melancholy that had evolved to outright grief, saw the gleam of tears in those gray eyes, wondered at the vicious strength it must be taking to keep them from spilling over.

            “Promise me that you’ll stay safe. Stay alive. Stop trying to follow me, Steve. Just... just stay here,” Bucky spoke, his tone somewhere in between a command and a plea, and Steve actively felt his whole being yearning to give in, to promise Bucky. But he _couldn’t_ , not when the very love that made him want to give in was the very love that would never let him.

            “You know I can’t do that,” Steve managed, watched as that strength broke, a tear rolling from each eye, and knew he’d never seen anything more heartbreaking in his life.

            “Steve, for me-” Bucky bit out raggedly, and Steve shook his head even as he gathered a bravery he’d never had before, and placed a hand on Bucky’s neck, fingers weaving into the soft, waving strands of hairs. _Just in case, he never got the chance again. Just in case..._

            “I can’t stop, Bucky. Not knowing you’ll be there. I will do everything I can to follow you,” Steve vowed, determination vibrating in every word. Steve didn’t dare voice that incredible, consuming, shattering emotion in his heart that was all for Bucky, but this, _this_ he could say. Bucky closed his eyes, hearing the finality in Steve’s tone. Knowing it was true. And mourned the fact, if Steve somehow managed it, and God knew if anyone could, Steve would, that following Bucky would surely be the death of him. Unable to hold back the ragged sobs that jerked in his chest, Bucky pulled Steve tight against him, damning every reason that had kept him from doing exactly this in the past.

            “Promise you’ll stay alive then. Promise me Steve. And I promise you this, I _will_ come back for you. No matter how long it takes.”

            Eyes closed as his own tears streamed freely now, Steve tucked his face against Bucky’s chest, heard the heart within it beating so strongly. And prayed that it continued to do just that. Just keep beating. “I promise,” he whispered.


	2. Chapter 2

Hand held warmly in a delicate grasp of metal, the fit of their fingers perfect, Steve looked over at Bucky as they walked, drinking in the sight of the man next to him, his features somehow softer than normal in the late evening sunlight. Catching his gaze, Bucky smiled, and despite the changes the decades had made on both his face and his heart, that smile, it was the same one Steve had loved as a young boy, who even then had known that smile was a glimpse into the most beautiful soul he’d ever seen. Now, the man knew the agony and pain which had buried that smile for years, and so treasured it more than ever, for the struggle it had taken Bucky to find it again. When at last, unconquered by the odds, fate had defeated every single one, and brought them back together, it had taken an age for Bucky to even look at Steve with something other than a flat, distant expression. The cold stare of a blade that was weighing the benefits of slicing deep or staying still. Bucky had been at loose ends, and it was all the more painful to witness because he was so contained. Bucky’s soul was buried so deep, he himself could not at that point even hear its cries.

            Yet Steve had waited. Unable to believe that Bucky, his Bucky, was here. Refused to grasp the idea gently worded by his friends that _his_ Bucky might never return, no matter that the Winter Soldier wore his face. Steve hadn’t listened. Once before in his life, he’d feared Bucky was lost to him, when he’d discovered the 107 th had been taken. Once before in his life, he’d known Bucky was lost to him, when he’d watched his best friend, and his only love, fall through air to the unforgiving ice below. Witnessing it, a part of Steve had died as well. From that moment forward, Steve lived the nightmare that used to make him wake gasping, and had seen no end to it. Not until he’d aimed that plane for the ice, and though he hadn’t intended to give up his life without a fight, he could see the tragically beautiful sense of it all. The ice had torn Bucky and himself apart. And the ice would reunite them once more. Steve, as always, following Bucky, a step behind, a moment too late.

            And then, Steve had woken up, utterly alone. Trying to live again, making the decision to move forward, was the most difficult thing he’d ever done. His own smile felt lost, happiness a feeling he no longer could grasp, though he remembered so perfectly, so painfully, what it had felt like. How he’d felt with Bucky.

            Bucky, who had traveled across the ocean and across the ages to stand before Steve once more, in a firefight that Steve hadn’t realized at first was a battle for any chance of happiness he’d ever have again. But once the other man had been unmasked, and understanding at last Bucky was alive, Steve had chased him, relentlessly, inexorably, refusing to lose the man a third time. His heart, which beat so strongly through an incredible feat of science, would simply give out. There were some wounds even the serum could not overcome, and Steve knew without a doubt the damage that loss would inflict would be the end of him. And so he’d ceaselessly searched for that face he knew better than his own, even though out of it stared the gaze of a stranger.

            Yet in the end, it was Bucky who had found him. Just as he had in the very beginning, rescuing Steve from a fury of flying fists and cruel words from the bullies who had been attacking him. This time he’d arrived, silently saving Steve from the blows and bruises he was inflicting upon himself with the guilt that was eating him alive.

            Steve had stared into the flat stare of a blade, and understood that the man he’d loved more than life itself was buried deep. But he’d known, no matter the wounds it may have sustained in its time being used as nothing more than a weapon, the heart inside was still the same. So despite all the warnings of the people who had come to love him, Steve had known he could wait forever for Bucky to remember Steve, remember himself. So long as Bucky was breathing, Steve would never give up.

            So they’d existed, together. Both waiting for something more, though neither had been sure how to get there. Steve, wanting more than anything now that he’d been given one more opportunity, to tell Bucky exactly how he’d always felt. Yet he’d held back, knowing that Bucky was struggling to piece back the shattered pieces of himself. He didn’t need the added weight of knowing he owned Steve so completely when he was just barely coming to understand he owned himself, and could do, could _be_ whoever he wanted. Bucky had wanted to understand both himself, and why this man drew him as nothing else he could remember in his fractured mind ever had.

            In the end, it was Bucky’s bravery that had gotten them both there. It had made a perfect sort of sense, Steve decided. After all, hadn’t it always been Bucky, so brave and strong and bigger than life, that Steve had tried so desperately to emulate? At last, at last, they’d both said out loud what they meant to each other. And speaking the love that had been a silent, aching thing in his chest throughout the ages, Steve had finally felt it spreading through him, that feeling he’d thought he’d lost forever. He felt happy.

            It had been over a year since Bucky had returned to him, and Steve still felt that incredible sensation every single day, staring into the face he knew so well. Their life was anything but simple, and some days the lingering pain of the damage that had been done to them both threatened to overwhelm. Yet they faced it together.

            Everything had taken time. First for Bucky to string sentences together. For him to ask questions. For him to make requests. And at last, when Steve always unquestioningly gave him everything he could, anything Bucky would accept, himself included, with a hint of his old arrogance and swagger, Bucky had gained the confidence to make demands. This morning, he’d woken Steve by tossing a pillow at his head with all the force and accuracy of an ex-assassin, and told Steve to be ready to go out for a nice dinner at six that evening, location to be revealed, and he’d damn well better dress up. Steve, who always wanted to do anything Bucky did simply because it meant the two of them would be together, had still yanked Bucky onto the mattress and proceeded to try and tickle their destination out of him. While his tactics hadn’t caused Bucky to disclose the apparently confidential information, it had turned his tickling attack into a wrestling match that had eventually left them both more than a little distracted, thoughts of dinner far from their mind.

            So when Bucky had taken Steve to a wonderful little restaurant in Brooklyn, the air lit by flickering candles, Bucky looking devastatingly handsome in a black suit, Steve had been surprised. And more, he’d been moved by the wonderful evening Bucky had clearly gone to some trouble to make for them, the men whiling away the evening over a wonderful meal, truly exquisite wine, and the kind of easy conversation which had been so hard won that Steve gloried in it now. Staring at Bucky, Steve wondered if it had perhaps been inevitable that he be transformed into this stronger physical version of himself. Because the love he felt for Bucky, it was such an all-consuming, life altering thing, his old heart, so fragile and erratic, couldn’t have withstood the force of it forever. But now, this strong beat within his chest, it never faltered, and every beat was for Bucky.

            At last Bucky had pulled Steve to his feet, and keeping the blond’s hand clasped in his own, Bucky had led them out onto the street, quietly admiring the lights that flickered on as the sun sank behind the ever changing skyline of trees and buildings reaching towards the atmosphere. In silence, they had walked together, both men savoring the simple yet powerful fact that they were both alive, they were together, and they could walk down the street hand in hand for the world to see without fear. Observing the neighborhood that had changed so much since they had been young boys living there, fighting to make their way, Steve knew he would always love it, even if he didn’t live there now. Sparing another glance at Bucky who looked peaceful in this moment, Steve wondered if some day they might live here together, again. Felt a little jolt of wonder knowing it’s a possible future that was in their grasp, if only they wanted it.

            Meeting Steve’s eyes, the blue of them looking darker in the glow of the street, Bucky felt that familiar ache when Steve smiled at him. Still struggling to understand _how_ he could wake up every day, and know that special smile would always be waiting for him, although he no longer doubted it. Bucky might never comprehend how it could be, that the best person he’d ever known had, as he’d discovered, always loved him, and despite all the shadows in Bucky’s heart and the blood on Bucky’s hands, loved him still. But Steve never lied. And so, impossible as it seemed, Bucky knew Steve meant it when he told Bucky he’d love him for the rest of forever.

            “Just a little further,” Bucky promised, and watched as Steve slowly absorbed those words, finally looking away from Bucky to observe where they were when Bucky fell still. Something unreadable flickered behind those eyes, and Bucky, who had once known every expression on that beautiful face, hoped he would again someday soon. Taking a breath, he gently tugged on Steve’s hand, leading him away from the street as he pulled him into the small square of trees, growing determinedly between the buildings and roads that surrounded it.

            Feeling a painful clenching within his chest, a flickering ache that for a moment had Steve fearing his old, worn out heart beat within him once more, Steve made to say something, though he had no idea what. Yet when he glanced at Bucky, and saw the small, almost _hesitant_ smile upon his face, Steve bit back his words. But couldn’t hold back his small gasp when Bucky pulled him into the small clearing, the sounds of the city filtered, far away.   Stepping forward, blinking as he stared around this spot that he remembered with photographic clarity, it shocked him how much the same it looked. The trees, they were exactly as he recalled them. Yet now there were a thousand lights strung through the branches, specks of brightness like stars illuminating the clearing, for all the world looking as though the heavens in this moment existed here on earth.

            Moving into that light, Steve felt Bucky’s hand slowly slide away, yet couldn’t prevent his forward motion until he stopped at the tree stump. That once living thing that had been touched by heaven in a brilliant flash of light and energy. And saw that it hadn’t been an end at all. Simply a new beginning. “It grew back,” Steve spoke, his voice soft as he touched the new growth that had sprouted from the stump in seventy years’ time, branches reaching towards the heaven that had touched it. Needing to share the wonder, knowing this meant something even if he couldn’t say what, Steve turned back to see Bucky regarding him with solemn eyes, hands shoved into his pants pockets.

            “I came back here,” Bucky said quietly, eyes flickering towards his tree before meeting Steve’s once more. “After the helicarrier, after I’d left the country... . Something drew me back. I didn’t understand what. Didn’t even know at that point that I’d ever been here before. But as I simply existed, trying to figure out what to do next without being given orders – a mission - I somehow ended up back here.”

            Slowly approaching now, Bucky reached out a hand, metal delicately brushing over wood as he skimmed fingertips over his tree. “I don’t know how long I stood here. It could have been hours, a day. Back then time didn’t mean as much to me. At first I didn’t even know why I was here, why this one, single, simple tree meant anything at all. But eventually, I realized that staring at it, I remembered something. I remembered you.”

            Feeling his breath hitch, Steve bit his lip as he listened to Bucky speaking. Knowing no matter how imagining Bucky lost and alone hurt him, Steve needed to just listen, to hear whatever Bucky had to say. So rather than saying anything, he inhaled an unstable breath, and laid a hand on Bucky’s shoulder. Because no matter the circumstance, he couldn’t be near Bucky and not touch. Not after all the time they’d lost.

            “I didn’t remember everything. About you, or this place. But it was enough to connect that memory of that small, blond boy to the man who I’d faced on that crashing helicarrier. The man who’d refused to fight me. And that’s when I decided to come find you.”

            Turning, Bucky stared into Steve’s eyes, and spoke almost urgently now. Needing Steve to see the sincerity in him, to know the truth. “I remember it all now Steve. How I had to leave. How I promised I would come back. And how you promised to stay alive.”

            Jaw clenching, Steve nodded. Unable to say a word.

            “You kept your promise. And even though it took longer than either of us would ever have thought possible, I kept mine.   I came back to you. And now, I want to make you a new promise.”

            Eyes that were already damp grew wide when Bucky stepped back, and then smoothly dropped down to one knee, hand holding Steve’s while metal fingers deftly opened the small box, revealing the ring of shining platinum. “I promise that no matter what comes, I will never leave you again. I love you, and will spend the rest of my life trying to show you just how much. Will you marry me?”

            Letting out a shaking breath, than ended on a shaking laugh, Steve nodded. “Yes, Bucky. Of course. A thousand times yes.” The grin that burst over Bucky’s face was blinding, bright enough to make all the stars in all the heavens seem dim in comparison. Carefully sliding the ring onto Steve’s finger, Bucky blinked when he was suddenly lifted to his feet, feeling the cool glide of the metal when Steve wrapped his hand around Bucky’s neck and pressed their lips warmly together. Wrapping his arms around Steve’s waist, Bucky drank in the feel of his lover, holding each other the way they’d both ached to do the first time they stood there. And as he absorbed the heat of Steve pressed so close, and felt the painless burn inside him that was love, Bucky knew that Steve was the lightning that had struck him. Permanently altered the person he’d been before, making him grow into something new.

            Together, they became something better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now while the Marvel version of their goodbye was delightful, I feel their obviously cannon love for each other demands so much more in terms of a goodbye. Steve conveying that he WILL follow Bucky no matter what, and Bucky wanting Steve to stay safe no matter what. This is my version of how this should have gone. I apologize for the feels but truly, it's nearly impossible for me to write without them. If you like the story, comments and kudos truly make my day! This story takes place both before and after my story Real or Not Real, so if you fancied this one, I recommend checking out that as well.


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